Game Killer/Game_Killer.bin/210.MJSOLVER.DOC

Text File | 1990-08-21 | 14KB | 278 lines

                                MJSOLVER v1.1
                      Copyright (C) 1990 by Ken McDonald



        --------------------- What Is MJSOLVER? ----------------------

           MJSolver is designed for use with Mah Jongg 3.3 (C) by Nels
        Anderson.  It's  major  function is to rapidly test any of the
        65536 Mah Jongg boards for the best possible score.

           MJSOLV11 is hereby released as shareware. If you enjoy this
        product and decide to keep using it, please send the suggested
        registration  price of $5.00  (in U.S. funds, please) to me at
        the address found at the end of this document.

           You may freely distribute MJSOLV11 (and are even encouraged
        to do so!) as long as the  following files are included intact
        and in unedited form within the archived package:

             MJSOLVER.EXE - the main MJSolver program
             AUTOSOLV.EXE - calls Mah Jongg for auto-play
             MJSOLVER.DOC - this document

           The archiving method may  be changed as  necessary, however
        no other  alterations, additions or  deletions are authorized.
        While MJSOLV11 is meant to be used with  Mah Jongg 3.3 (and is
        quite dependent upon it), it may not be bundled with  this, or
        any other  software package, without the express permission of
        the authors.

           This software is released  in as is condition.  Although it
        has been tested on several different hardware  configurations,
        there is simply no way  to guarantee it's  performance or com-
        patibility on every possible  setup. The author will therefore
        accept  no responsibility nor liability for any damage arising
        from it's  use or  distribution  and  does hereby disclaim any
        warranties, either implied or expressed.




        ----------------------- What It Does: ------------------------

           How many times have you started a  Mah Jongg game which has
        ended after removing only 20 or 30 tiles?  How about all those
        games that have ended  with only 2 (or 4, or 16) tiles remain-
        ing?   Does  the  "Additional Boards Played:"  section of your
        statistics file far outweigh the "List of Boards Won:"?  Well,
        now  MJSolver  can help you win some  of these boards that you
        might otherwise have given up on!

           MJSolver will run as many as  65535 simulated  plays on any
        board input from the user, while presenting a running tally of
        it's progress.  After  running the  simulations, you will have
        the  option of playing the board yourself or, if you'd rather,
        let MJSolver show you the best solution that it came up with.




        ----------------------- Using MJSOLVER -----------------------

           MJSolver may be run from the DOS prompt or via a batch file
        (more on the .BAT  method later)  on either a floppy- or hard-
        drive based system. In either case, there should be disk space
        available for MJSolver to save a file which contains the moves
        resulting in the  best score achieved during the  simulations,
        as well as it's own statistics file. See the "defaults" infor-
        mation below, and the ---Menu Options--- section for details.

           MJSolver  uses information entered at the command line when
        it is first run.  To see the parameters it uses,  from the DOS
        prompt type:

             MJSOLVER ? <CR>      (There must be 1 or more spaces
                                   between "MJSOLVER" and "?")

        Note:  The symbol "<CR>" is used in this document to signify a
               carriage return.

           You  will then  see an  example  of the syntax as well as a
        brief reminder of the type of information MJSolver expects for
        each parameter. No particular order is necessary when entering
        these parameters, nor are they all needed for MJSolver to run.
        If you leave out any  parameters or enter any information that
        MJSolver doesn't understand,  certain defaults will be used as
        explained below.

             -bx     Passes the board  number to MJsolver.  Legal
                     values for "x" are any number  between 0 and
                     65535. Default = random number.




             -sx     The number of  simulations  you wish to run.
                     Enter any value from 1 to 65535 for "x". De-
                     fault = 1000.

             -pax    Tells  MJSolver where  Mah Jongg is located.
                     This might be needed if the Mah  Jongg files
                     are in a  different  drive  and/or directory
                     than where MJSolver was run from.  (MJSolver
                     automatically searchs the current directory,
                     all directories found in your PATH, and then
                     the directory that  MJSolver  itself resides
                     in for MAHJONGG.EXE)

             -px     This is used to slow down the (A)uto play of
                     the board tested.  Values for "x" may be any
                     number between  0 and 5000. Default = 10 ms.
                     (Example: "-p2000" = 2 second delay.)

             -q      While running the simulations, MJSolver will
                     beep to indicate that it has found a winning
                     sequence of moves.  Using the "-q" parameter
                     will suppress this beep, telling MJSolver to
                     run in "quiet" mode. Default = beep is "ON".

             <mjs>   Any parameters you wish to pass to Mah Jongg
                     should  also be included, if the board is to
                     be played following the simulations. In gen-
                     eral, any options you would  normally use to
                     run  Mah Jongg  should also be entered here.
                     (Example:  "-e -uwb" uses EGA color graphics
                     and selects the Warner Bros. tile set.)  The
                     normal  defaults for  Mah Jongg will be used
                     if nothing is otherwise specified.

           As mentioned  earlier,  MJSolver saves game-play statistics
        to a seperate file,  called "AUTOSTAT" by default. The purpose
        here is to keep from  "padding" your own statistics file  with
        those generated during testing and any subsequent play. If you
        wish, you may override this by specifying the filename of your
        existing statistics file. (e.g. "-f\mahstats")

           Valid command lines used to start MJSolver could then range
        from the simple: "MJSOLVER <CR>" to the extreme: "MJSOLVER -b9
        -s2000  -paC:\GAMES\MAHJONGG  -q  -fC:\GAMES\MAHJONGG\MAHSTATS
        -p5 -t20 -e -uwb <CR>"!  The first example  instructs MJSolver
        to run 1000  simulations on a randomly  selected  board,  beep
        upon each win, save statistics  to AUTOSTATS, use a 10ms delay
        for auto-play,  and use  all default  Mah Jongg  options.  The
        second will run 2000 simulations on board number 9,  change to
        C:\GAMES\MAHJONGG (if the board will be later played), silence
        the beeps,  save statistics to C:\GAMES\MAHJONGG\MAHSTATS, use
        a 5ms (auto-play) delay, time (manual) play to 20 minutes, and
        run in EGA color graphics mode with the Warner Bros. tile set!




        --------------------- Running From a .BAT --------------------

           As you can see from the preceding example, the command line
        could get somewhat long and complex. A better method may be to
        make a batch file similiar to the following MJS.BAT:

        @echo off             (remove "@" if using DOS 3.2 or earlier)
        cd \games\mjsolver       (assumes MJSOLV11 files are here....)
        mjsolver -b%1 -s2000 -pac:\games\mahjongg -q    │PUT ALL THIS│
         -fc:\games\mahjongg\mahstats -p5 -t20 -e -u%2  │ON ONE LINE!│

           Running MJS.BAT by typing  "MJS 9 WB <CR>"  will then cause
        MJSolver to use the same setup as in the  2nd example from the
        previous section!




        -------------------- The MJSolver Display --------------------

           Using whichever method you prefer, once MJSolver is running
        you will be  presented with a "working" screen  indicating the
        board number currently being tested,  the number of games com-
        pleted,  the current test score,  the average score, the "best
        case" and  "worst case"  results, and the number of wins found
        so far for this board. On the message bar at the bottom of the
        screen you'll see "Analyzing xxxx Simulations", indicating how
        many times  MJSolver will  test the selected board, and "Press
        "Q" to Quit". If a solution has been found, or if you just de-
        cide not to let MJSolver finish the set number of simulations,
        you may halt the program at any time by pressing this key. The
        process may then be resumed by striking <CR>.

           It should probably be pointed out here that the method used
        during testing is based on random selection of tile pairs with
        equal weight given to all legal moves.  Because of this random
        nature, a winning combination of moves may not be found during
        the first set of simulations run. As with all such random pro-
        cesses,  the results will  be more statistically correct for a
        large number of tests and may not reflect the results you will
        achieve using your own methods.  Don't be too surprised if you
        beat a "hard" board on your first attempt, or if an "easy" one
        seems impossible!  This is the reason for AUTOSOLV: to let you
        watch the board being played using the sequence of moves found
        by MJSolver. This also leads into the next section....




        ------------------------ Menu Options ------------------------

           Once finished with the simulations, the message bar will be
        replaced offering the options listed below. Entering the high-
        lighted letter selects that option.

             Next -  Allows you to run simulations again. Hitting
                     "N" displays the next  board number. You may
                     then hit  <CR> to select this board or <ESC>
                     to clear the number.  Hit <ESC> once more to
                     cancel this option or type in the  number of
                     your own choice followed by <CR> to run.

             Play -  This is the manual play option. Mah Jongg is
                     then loaded and run  using  the play options
                     specified on the MJSolver command line.

             Auto -  Selecting this option will cause MJSolver to
                     save  the best-case moves to disk (using the
                     default  filename of MAHMOVES.DAT). AUTOSOLV
                     then calls Mah Jongg, and the board is play-
                     ed using MAHMOVES.DAT as input. If the board
                     was found to be winnable, the last two tiles
                     will not be removed by AUTOSOLV. This allows
                     you to replace  tiles and manually play from
                     any point you may choose. Note: MAHMOVES.DAT
                     will be overwritten as new data is saved.

             Save -  Allows you to save  the moves information to
                     disk under a unique filename. The default is
                     in the  form "bd_xxxxx.dat" where xxxxx is a
                     five digit  representation of the board num-
                     ber. Hit <ESC> to clear the default filename
                     and then type in your own. Hitting <CR> uses
                     the name supplied, while a second <ESC> can-
                     cels the option.

             Exit -  Quits MJSolver and  exits to DOS. (All other
                     selections will return  you to the "options"
                     screen upon completion.)




        ----------------------- Using AUTOSOLV -----------------------

           Although AUTOSOLV is primarily  designed to be run from the
        options  menu of MJSolver, it may also be run from the command
        line providing a  way to later  use any saved data files.  The
        syntax is the same as for  MJSolver and uses the same  "-pax",
        "-px"  and "<mjs>"  parameters.   Enter the name of any stored
        moves file using "-nf" where "f" represents the filename.  You
        must provide a filename for  AUTOSOLV although it will default
        to MAHMOVES.DAT if the specified file cannot be found.




        ------------------- Registering MJSolver ---------------------

           I certainly hope that you will enjoy using these programs &
        that they prove to be interesting and helpful utilities! If so
        the $5.00 requested registration fee would be much appreciated
        and would  provide encouragement to further refine and improve
        this product. Please  include any  comments and/or suggestions
        and mail to:

                          Ken McDonald
                          PO Box 654
                          Walled Lake, MI  48390-0654